P.O. Box 297, Eutawville, S.C. 29048

SaveTheSCV@yahoo.com

March 13, 2003

General Executive Council
Sons of Confederate Veterans

Gentlemen:

Please allow me to address you with regard to the situation that currently faces the Sons of Confederate Veterans. The SCV is faced with a crisis, but the crisis is not the Save the SCV movement, nor is it the collision of philosophies that resulted in Save the SCV. The crisis is the abandonment of the SCV’s commitment to our own constitutional process.

Rather than allowing our elections to settle philosophical differences as the SCV constitution requires, the Wilson administration has decided that SSCV supporters will not be permitted to participate in the electoral process. Save the SCV is nothing more than an internal political campaign designed to effect a change in leadership. The Commander-in-Chief has no constitutional authority to deprive those who are opposed to his administration the right to vote in SCV elections. However, that is precisely what CIC Ron Wilson has done in suspending SSCV supporters.

From the beginning, we at Save the SCV announced our intention to identify SCV office-holders that we oppose "and vote them out of the organization or obtain their resignations." This publicly stated goal clearly identifies Save the SCV supporters as members of an internal opposition movement: loyal to the SCV but opposed to the current administration. Not surprisingly, CIC Wilson finds himself in conflict with our tactics, our supporters and our philosophy.

CIC Wilson is required by the SCV constitution (Article XIV, Sec.7) to work with internal opposition to resolve conflict. If conflict-resolution is not possible, the next round of elections would normally settle the matter. Instead, SSCV supporters many of whom publicly identified themselves on our website (www.savethescv.org) were condemned as disloyal agitators who are supposedly in league with the SPLC, NAACP, the liberal media and whatever additional demons the membership might believe. These allegations would allow CIC Wilson to declare SSCV supporters to be, "detrimental to the confederation": a chargeable offense. Using this tactic and playing on the siege-mentality that exists in the SCV’s membership, CIC Wilson’s backers gathered a list of supporters with their website (www.scvleadership.org). The political cover provided by the website’s comparatively few testimonials gave CIC Wilson the opportunity to eliminate opposition administratively; as opposed to risking a public debate on the issues and a protracted election campaign.

Feeling thus empowered, CIC Wilson suspended seven camps, four brigade commanders and disenfranchised perhaps 350 SCV members: a purge that is unprecedented in SCV history. The traditional right to visit camps ended for SSCV supporters. They were threatened with arrest at one camp and with forcible removal at others: threats that CIC Wilson has personally allowed to stand. Division Commanders were told to suppress the SSCV message. Voting rights at the North Carolina Division meeting were denied to these camps and individuals.

Mr. Wilson’s response to legitimate internal opposition is nothing more than a dictatorial abuse of his office. His actions are designed to silence critics and manipulate the electoral process in favor of a radical faction within the SCV. CIC Wilson is eliminating opposition to the Kirk Lyons/League of the South/Council of Conservative Citizens faction, thus insuring their victory in the next election. Who would be foolish enough to publicly oppose them now?

This technique is consistent with another dictatorial strategy: resolution-based governance, which is the practice of superceding an organization’s constitution and/or bylaws with resolutions. This method was proposed for governing the entire SCV on Kirk Lyons’ website when he ran for ANV commander. Wilson supported Lyons for that post and is now using the method that Mr. Lyons suggested: pack conventions with your supporters, intimidate and shout-down the opposition, then pass your resolutions. Gilbert Jones’ treatment at the Memphis convention and the passage of the "Memphis resolution" are examples of this technique.

Suspended ANV commander Charles Hawks is charged with divulging restricted information. His actual "crime" is that he never took steps to silence Gilbert Jones. Mr. Hawks will be tried before a tribunal of Wilson appointees hundreds of miles from his home; insuring both his inconvenience and his conviction. Suspended camp members, their commanders and brigade commanders who refuse to resign from the SCV will be tried at the convention at Asheville, N.C. next August, in an atmosphere rife with hostility.

If CIC Wilson’s abuse of office is permitted to stand, the radical faction that now controls the SCV will continue to do so. The Kirk Lyons/LoS/CCC take-over of the SCV will be completed. This will happen without the membership ever deciding; much less being permitted to vote on what philosophical direction the SCV should take. If those who speak-out against a current administration can be declared "detrimental to the confederation" and denied the right to express their views, the national membership will never be able to give its informed consent through the election process.

Save the SCV is a legitimate opposition movement within the Sons of Confederate Veterans and should be treated as such. Instead, CIC Wilson has handled criticism of his regime like a third-world dictator. I’m not going to ask that we SSCV supporters be tried fairly. We shouldn’t be tried at all. The GEC should restore our memberships and have all charges against us dropped without any of us having to go to a convention, appear before a tribunal, or spend any of our time and effort trying to undo what should never have been done to us. The future of the Sons of Confederate Veterans rests squarely in your hands.

If you gentlemen allow the current administration to disregard the SCV’s constitution and electoral process, you will have destroyed a fine organization just as surely as if you had struck the fatal blow yourselves.

Your Obedient Servant,

Walter C. Hilderman III, Commander
Sgt. Aaron L. DeArmond Camp #1981
Sons of Confederate Veterans
Co-founder: Save the SCV